The present invention relates to a technology that distributes information from a server to an on-board terminal for car navigation or the like capable of externally connecting a communication device such as a cellular phone.
A communication terminal such as a high function cellular phone so-called “smart phone”) has become common to perform data communication through a wireless LAN (Local Area Network) or a mobile communication network such as an LTE (Long Term Evolution) network. The high function cellular phone can execute a variety of software similar to a PC (Personal Computer), and a user can freely install such software. Since the high function cellular phone has the above features, its affinity to the Web service is high, and various services are provided.
On-board terminals such as car navigation units which are often not provided with a communication function use a communication terminal including a high function cellular phone r the like and inter-equipment communications such as USB (Universal Serial Bus) and Bluetooth (registered trademark) to use indirectly a service assuming data communication such as a Web service on the communication terminal side. For example, when the communication terminal retrieves information on a destination by an Internet search function and instructs a search for a route to the destination, information on the destination is transmitted to the car navigation side. And, the car navigation device performs a route search, and the result is shown on the car navigation device.
The above cooperation between the communication terminal and the on-board terminal is realized by cooperation between their software. Provision of the cooperation function by the software facilitates the addition of software by the user, and for example, it becomes possible to add software corresponding to a new service. It is general for the communication terminal that delivery of software which operates on the terminal, such as delivery of an application or an update of an OS (Operating System), is performed from a server through a communication network. The delivery of software, which operates on the onboard terminal, to the onboard terminal is also performed from the server through the communication network by connecting to the communication terminal.
According to the above method, a vehicle occupant connects the communication terminal, which is in a state connected to the onboard terminal in the vehicle, to the server, selects software desired to be obtained, takes the purchase procedure if necessary, and obtains the desired software into the on-board terminal from the server through the communication network and the communication terminal.
The above conventional technology, however, needs to keep the communication terminal the state connected to the on-board terminal until the software acquisition is completed, and for example, it takes a long time to obtain large capacity software, and there was a problem that the vehicle occupant cannot leave the vehicle until the software acquisition was completed.
To solve the problem, there is a technology described in JP-A-2007-199972 According to the technology described in JP-A-2007-199972, a download system for vehicles comprises a server equipped with an e-commerce site for selling software or content data on-line, a communication terminal having identification information for the communication terminal, and an on-board terminal which stores the identification information for the communication terminal and has identification information for the on-board terminal, transmits the identification information for the on-board terminal and the identification information for the communication terminal to the server via the communication terminal, purchases data according to the identification information, stores the purchased data into the cellular phone, and obtains the stored data by the on-board terminal.
Thus, the on-board terminal accesses the server via the communication terminal, the server specifies the on-board terminal using the identification information for the on-board terminal, further specifies software for the specified on-board terminal, and transmits it to the communication terminal which temporarily stores the software transmitted from the server.
Thus, it is not necessary to keep the communication terminal in a state connected to the on-board terminal until the acquisition of software is completed, and the software can be obtained continuously even if the owner of the communication terminal leaves the vehicle while the owner carries the communication terminal.